Love Is Not All, or Is It?

Dr. Patricia Cove Jeremie Lagace ANGL 1163: Introduction to English II Essay #1, Winter 2013 Edna St. Vincent Millay, “Love is Not All” Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain; Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink And rise and sink and rise and sink again; 5 Love can not fill thickened lung with breath, Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone; Yet many a man is making friends with death Even as I speak, for lack of love alone It well may be that in a difficult hour, 10 Pinned down by pain and moaning for release, Or nagged by want past resolution’s power, I might be driven to sell your love for peace, Or trade the memory of this night for food It well may be I do not think I would. Part I: Paraphrase the Poem. Love isn’t everything, it’s not food, beverages, sleep and it sure won’t act as a roof against the rain. Love cannot offer a sinking man in peril a life-saving “floating spar”. As he rises, he sinks, only to rise and sink again. Love cannot give the air we need to fill our “thickened lung”, it can not clean blood or heal broken bones. Yet for all the things love can’t do, a man without love is a man “making friends with death”. The lack of love alone in a difficult hour will pin you down by pain, whine for release or harass you by the power of past resolution’s. One might be driven to sell love for peace, trade their memories for a meal, but never give up love even if it was to release horrible pains or to get food to live.

Part II: Scan the Poem. / = stressed syllable ^ = unstressed syllable \ = half-stressed syllable || = significant pause ^ / | ^ / | ^ / | ^ / | ^ / | 1 Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink A ^ / | ^ / | ^ / | ^ / | ^ / | 2 Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain; B ^ /

Cited: Edna St. Vincent Millay, “Love is Not All” (456)